The New York Times seems quite happy to trot out the standard myths about how Africa is waiting to be tossed the left-belt of genetically modified food. Here’s a response to a piece that the paper published a little while ago, by John Collins Rudolf, that offers perhaps the only attempt we’ve seen at addressing some of the issues that Eric Holt-Gimenez, Annie Shattuck and I raised in our Nation magazine piece a few months back. Predictably, Rudolf offers no new evidence, but the triumph of this dodgy thinking succeeds not through graceful argument, coherence or evidence, but ceaseless and powerful repetition. More below the fold. Continue reading “Hurdles in Thinking about Hunger- A Letter to the New York Times”
Clinton on Haiti: My Bad
At the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on 10th March, two Bills – Clinton and Gates – offered their thoughts on New Directions in Global Health. Gates was there, in part, to pitch for the Lugar-Casey Act. Clinton hasn’t left a paper trail, so I’ll be listening to the recorded hearing as I fall asleep tonight. But the Associated Press’ Jonathan Katz has already put his finger on a key admission – the bit where the President said ““I had to live every day with the consequences of the loss of capacity to produce a rice crop in Haiti to feed those people because of what I did; nobody else.” Except, um, it was a policy that Reagan had already put in place. Still, more below the fold. Continue reading “Clinton on Haiti: My Bad”
Rich Dad, Poor Son, Unlikely
Rich Dad, Poor Dad was a worldwide publishing phenomenon, allowing Robert Kiyosaki to sell 26 million books packed with the insight he gained through hours of playing Monopoly. Kiyosaki, in turn, trades on and propagates the idea that, yes, you too can become a millionaire through hard work, diligence, and following the advice of your pretend rich dad. This, clearly, is bogus.
Healthcare Barometrics
The Congressional healthcare melodrama here in the US took another twist today, with the passage of the House version of the bill. The mediocre bill will become worse in the Senate on Tuesday. The tragedy, of course, is that single-payer healthcare was always the most sensible option. Underlying the dire need for bigger thinking is a recent report from Amnesty International, as covered by a terrific article by Michelle Chen on RaceWire, about maternal mortality rates. According to Amnesty
